Event Details
Club: | BM MBO |
Event Name: | National Championships Day Two & Event 7 - Forest of Dean |
Date: | 23/07/17 |
Format: | MBO Score |
Mapping: | Ordnance Survey |
Time Limit: | 3 |
National League: | - |
League: | Black Mountains MBO (Round 7 of 10) |
Electronic Punch: | No |
Event Report
It was a great pleasure to be given the opportunity to run the BMBO Championships Week end this summer and invite you one of the largest areas of unbroken forestry left in England. //
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//As I started planning the event one of the biggest challenges I faced was to map the tracks, the Forestry Commission permission stipulated that we could only use Class 1 and 2 logging routes and all other tracks were not to be used. I work in the forest all summer so had plenty of time to do this and the simplest way of depicting them seemed to be to mark the ones you could use rather than cross off the ones you couldn’t. I am sorry for those who misunderstood this rule imposed on us, but the rangers are pretty strict and regularly check Strava following organised events. Therefore above genuine navigation errors we had to enforce this regulation if we thought it had been overlooked, especially on Sunday after we had clarified this regulation.//
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//As D-Day approached the weather looked as if it was really going to spoil the show, on Friday as I set the Controls (CPs) for day one the rain was coming down in stair rods and I started getting messages that riders understandably were delaying their arrival until Saturday morning. I was starting to worry, given the forecast people would not come at all, however I was pleased to see once I arrived back at the HQ, 20 or so vans and tents set up and competitors where in the hall avoiding the last of the rain. Saturday morning broke with sunshine bathing the sports ground and what seemed to have been a dry night, plenty of time for the trails to dry out a little. //
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//Day One’s course saw riders take on 36 CPs and a total of 750 points in the East and North of the forest and with a ride down to the deep valley north of Drybrook and a visit to Abenhall church it was going to be tough. I thought it was clearable but would need a great deal of thought on how to sweep up the controls in the middle of the map. Following Day One the top three spots where held by://
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//1st Ifor Powell – 740//
//2nd Ian Cartwright – 730//
//= 3rd Graham Tibbot & Mark Morgan – 720//
//First Female //
//Clare Dallimore – 710//
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//Day Two took riders to the south east of the forest and over towards the Coleford, the map was the same size but with 550 points and 10 less CPs there would be far less zig-zagging in the middle, but even with only 3 hours the likelihood of a clearance was deemed slight. The night had stayed dry again and as most riders wanted to wait for the morning showers to subside the finish line was going to be very busy at 1pm. With the scores so close after day there was all to play for as the riders started to arrive home it was clear that 3 or 4 CPs had to be dropped today by the top riders and it was going to be close. The results were://
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//1st Ifor Powell – 699//
//2nd Graham Tibbot – 495//
//3rd Clare Dallimore - 470//
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//Therefore after totalling up the scores the congratulations went to Ifor Powell who with two wins out of two came in as the overall winner on 1239 points out of a max 1300 points available, second was last year’s winner, Graham Tibbot just 24 points behind on 1215. The Female Championship title was taken by Clare Dallimore on 1180 points who was third overall. //
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//Well done also to all the Class winners and all those who took part, the full results are on the Black Mountains MBO Face Book page and the individual day scores are on Results link on the BMBO website. We hope you enjoyed it and we are sure to visit the area on future events. Quote of the week end ‘I couldn’t see the CP tree for the trees’ anon//
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//A big thank you to Soudley Village Hall for allowing us to use the facilities in a beautiful part of the country, Clare's Kitchen and Amanda's Gang for the catering, Gill & Andy for running registration, Lisa & Bryan for keeping the wild boar out & parking everyone up and to all those that helped clear up at the end. //
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//Thank you to The BMBO Chairman Tony Brand-Barker for coming down and presenting the awards. //
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//Also thank you for the kind donation of £111.45 which went to Severn Area Rescue Association (SARA) the local MRT equivalent.//
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//Have a great summer and see you 17th September at Trecastell near Brecon for Gary Davies ' Event//
//Diolch yn Fawr. //
//Siôn//
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